Marjane Satrapi burst onto the directorial scene with a keen
eye for visual flair and a sly feminist wit when she adapted her acclaimed
graphic novel Persepolis to the
screen as an animated feature. She then
went on to adapt her novel Chicken With
Plums to the big screen with a similar degree of success. Now we have The Voices, a truly bizarre addition to her filmography, not
really dealing with any themes or motifs that fit into her comfort zone, and
while this expansion into new territory certainly shows her struggle to move
beyond feminist intellectualism as her go-to subject, it is still a decent
enough film where I feel it deserves a recommendation.
Ryan Reynolds stars as Jerry, a pleasant enough guy who just
has something a little off about him. At
his factory job, he’s friendly and upbeat, but social niceties are a little
beyond him, so he comes off as weird to his coworkers. When Jerry goes home, he talks to his pet dog
and cat… and they talk right back. Jerry
suffers from some form of mental illness (a vague form of schizophrenia that is
never fully diagnosed) wherein his dog acts as his conscience and his cat as
his psychotic murderous id. Through
interacting with his animal “friends,” Jerry navigates the treacherous world of
dating, accidental killing, intentional killing, and sexual intimacy.
Satrapi plays to her strengths right off the bat by casting
the sets and characters in a darkly comic tone, with bright scenery and
perpetually polite characters populating the screen as the undercurrent of
Jerry’s approaching breakdown looms just below the surface. Reynolds is actually a surprisingly good fit
for the role, shedding his normal frat douche persona for a more innocent and
confused man who doesn’t know how to handle his loneliness. The film really shines when Jerry decides to
stop taking his meds, and the wool is pulled from both his and the audience’s
eyes as we see that his existence isn’t so bright and cheery as we would
believe.
Alas, that is also the film’s biggest stumbling block, as it
fumbles between wildly contrasting tones at the behest of the plot. The film starts as a dark comedy, and remains
as such for a good long while, but soon we start to get glimpses of Jerry’s
past and a scene shot from the perspective of one of his potential murder
victims, and suddenly the laughs come to a complete stop. It is rather jarring to spend one scene
talking with a disembodied head in a comically overblown accent, then another
seriously dwelling on child abuse and suicide as side effects of mental
illness. The scenes are handled well to
convey the tones that they are intended for, but the tones are so wildly
discordant that they don’t feel like they belong in the same film.
And yet, despite this issue, I had a good time with The Voices. Though definitely not the smartest work in
Marjane Satrapi’s portfolio, it remains consistently funny when it’s trying to
be, and the self-serious diversions aren’t so much film-breaking as they are
distracting. For fans of dark humor, I
say give this one a shot, and hope that Satrapi can continue making great work
after learning from her mistakes.
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